Thread by @levidmorrow

Dialogic Philosophy and the Memory of the Holocaust: A Thread
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I wanted to write this up fully but I won’t have time before Shabbat, so here’s a twitter thread:
Dialogic philosophy, roughly, theorizes dialogue, talking about how it works and using it as a basis for thinking about human existence more broadly.
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A key insight found among the various dialogic thinkers is the foundational distinction between the unique individual and their traits which are common property of all people.
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This is most famously Martin Buber’s distinction between 2nd and 3rd person speech, between talking *to* a “you” and talking *about* an “it.”

The “you” is the person themselves, the core of the other that can freely choose to be whoever it wants.
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The “it” is an object, anything that can be reduced to characteristics and descriptions that are common to all other objects.

This is a theology. God is the You of yous and defining a you by making it into an it is the greatest sin.
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Obviously, the You side seems more positive. On a certain reading of Buber, the goal is to relate to everything as a You, even dogs, trees, etc. Relating to things or people as Its is at best instrumentalist, at worst the root of all evil.
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A key result of this distinction that true dialogue, ironically, is wordless. The only way to encounter the other is to get past the wordy facts that they share in common with everyone else, to the truly unique You who they are behind the veil.
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All of the things a person shares in common with others, their home, language, interests, beliefs, affiliations, etc. can only be express as speaking *about* an it, not speaking *to* a you. It is only where a person is incomparable that they are unique (on this reading).
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So the question of the day: Do we speak *to* Auschwitz or *about* it

Is Auschwitz incomparably unique or does it share common features with other historical events?
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The claim that we cannot compare the Holocaust to anything essentially follows the above reading of Buber. To subject it to comparison is to make it a common (and political) tool. The only way to leave pristine its sacral nature is to isolate it from all comparison.
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However, to do so is to say that it has no facts, that there are no words that describe it. The above reading of Buber has been critiqued because when you take away all of the words about a person, all of the facts about them, you have made them into an idea, not a you.
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When we say Auschwitz is incomparable, we also say that it is an idea and not a real thing that happened. There’s danger here too.
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A better reading of Buber says that we need both you and it, to and about. The It is unavoidable, and makes us who we are. It provides our identity. The You is what prevents objectification, the reducing of a person to their identity and nothing more.
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We need a similar balance with Auschwitz. We need to be able to recognize that it was a real historical event, given to description in terms of facts and numbers, just like any other. Were the Nazi concentration camps similar to other concentration camps? If so how?
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Those are factual, empirical questions that can be answered through historical research.

Is the Holocaust incomparably unique? Yes.

That’s a theological assertion, one that I feel is obvious if you take a moment to stop and silently encounter the reality of event.
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This is the dialogue of Rosenzweig and Levinas, the infinite judging command of the face of the other. To encounter the Holocaust is to encounter the specific millions who died and deny their anonymity. It is a ghastly reality that demands memory.
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But it is the incomparable uniqueness of dialogue, which does not deny the real historical facts which give our dialogue-partner their identity. Le’havdil, you do not require a loved one to be identity-less in order to consider them unique.
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The Holocaust is similar. In order to tear it properly, to give it all the dignity and reality it demands, we have to let it be an It and You, a historical reality given to comparative description, and infinitely unique, commanding silence and commemoration as one.
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מי כמוך באלמים ה׳?

אחת דיבר אלוקים, שתיים זו שמעתי

20/20
שבת שלום

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